


Krampusnacht

by Thelittlescrimshaw



Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: F/M, Krampus AU, LETS GO DARK FOLKS, My contribution to the holiday/xmas aus out there, Mythology - Freeform
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-12-26
Updated: 2016-12-25
Packaged: 2018-09-12 07:04:13
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,759
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9061501
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Thelittlescrimshaw/pseuds/Thelittlescrimshaw
Summary: Krampus is responsible for punishing all children. Too bad Rey isn't going down without a fight.





	

**Author's Note:**

> My contribution to the holiday ficlets out there.

Putting out mulled wine at her doorstep every fifth of December was what her grandfather had called “keeping the old ways.” Rey wasn’t superstitious but her grandfather would do it, and this was would be her first Christmas without him, and Rey found his rituals comforting.

She was supposed to put out schnapps, but she already _had_ mulled wine, and she wasn’t about to go out and buy alcohol for a silly ritual.

She put it in a mug and left it at her doorstep, locking the door behind her.

It was just beginning to get cold. The clouds hung low in the sky, threatening snow. She’d have to buy rock salt one of these days for her driveway.

The house felt big and empty without her grandfather, and Rey had only half-decorated. She propped up the vintage postcards on the mantle and placed the old nutcrackers on the windowsills, and she was going out with Finn and Jess to get a tree soon.

Still, Rey felt like she was going through the motions.

She turned up the heat a few notches and padded upstairs. It was getting late; she’d better head to bed.

* * *

He flitted through the streets, appearing as no more than a shadow to anyone who dared look his way. His cloven hooves left no tracks in the freshly-fallen snow. His eyes glowed yellow and reflected light like a wolf’s.

He stopped in front of the last house in the cul-de sac. Here it was: his final stop, right at the tail end of the witching hour.

He ignored the mulled wine at the door and crossed the threshold.  Whoever lived here kept to the old ways – but whoever lived here had a child who had transgressed enough archaic laws to warrant a one-night dragging to hell.

The house was old and creaky and quiet as Krampus walked through it, feet falling silently on the floorboards. He opened the door of the child he’d take to hell with him for the night, and was more than surprised to find no child waiting for him.

Instead he was greeted with the sight of a half-naked young woman.

She caught sight of him and shrieked.

* * *

Rey yanked her shirt back on and scrambled to the far corner of her room where she kept the baseball bat. She was _really_ cursing the fact that she didn’t keep a firearm on her, but she’d never bothered to learn how to use a gun – and would a gun even work on this sort of _thing?_

Its bottom half was like a goat; its top half was half-man, half wolf: wild yellow eyes and vicious white fangs, tongue a gruesome shade of pink and lolling out of its mouth. Goat’s horns rose above its head and its hands ended in overlong, black nails.

And Rey meant to defend herself against it with a steel baseball bat. It had stopped dead in its tracks when Rey screamed

“What the fuck _are you?”_ she demanded. The bed was between them, but Rey suspected it didn’t matter, if he’d gotten past the locked door and the alarm system.

_This is what Poe meant about getting a dog,_ she thought. _A dog would sense this supernatural shit._

“Krampusss,” it hissed. Rey watched as it set its sack down – and something like _“oh dear god the myths are true I’m so fucked I’m so fucked”_ went through her head – and Krampus snapped his fingers and a whirl of black smoke surrounded him, until a tall, pale man wearing a heavy black cloak was standing before her. His yellow eyes and too-sharp claws and cloven feet and spiraled horns remained. “I am Krampus.”

“Well, _get out!”_

He _tsked._ “There is a child in this household. I cannot leave until said child is –“

“I’m the only one here!” Rey was bordering on hysterical, but she didn’t care. She’d read about bereavement hallucinations, but _this_ was ridiculous.

“This is a dream. I’m the only one here, and I’m nineteen. There’s no kid –“

He stepped forward, cloven feet making no sound on her floorboards. “You are a girl under the age of twenty-one. You are a child. And children are _my_ jurisdiction.”

Oh god, her grandfather had been _right._ Rey wanted to scream – she’d left out the mulled wine and she always swept her kitchen east to west and there was a goddamn iron triskelion hanging above her bedroom door. What _more_ could she have possibly _done?_

“And this is no dream,” he said. He heaved his sack up and set it upon her bed. The entire room smelled like cinnamon; the comforting scent was at odds with the monster before her.

Oh god, what would her grandfather do? Reason with it? Rey inhaled and tightened her grip on the baseball bat. “By law, I am not a child. I own this house. I’m past puberty. There’s no goddamn law that states I’m still a child –“

Krampus stomped his hoof, and Rey quaked with fear. “ _ENOUGH._ You are a child, and you’ve brought punishment upon yourself. I am to take you to Hell for this night to –“

Rey didn’t bother listening. She skirted around the side of the bed and bolted for the door, smacking Krampus across the chest with the baseball bat when he made a lunge for her. To her surprise, it burned his skin.

_Steel. Iron. Iron burns him!_ Rey was almost giddy with the discovery. The baseball bat _would_ work.

He cursed in a language Rey didn’t understand and she bolted, slamming the bedroom door behind her. She barreled down the stairs two at a time but stopped dead in her tracks when she saw him, in full monster-form, waiting at the bottom for her.

She turned tail and went back for her room. _His sack. I have to get his sack. As long as he can’t get me in there, I’ll be safe._

She could hear him bounding up the stairs behind her; Rey’s heart was in her throat as she ran down the hallway and into her bedroom and made a desperate, diving leap for Krampus’ bag.  

The moment her fingers brushed it Rey felt a tingle go through her, beginning in her hands and ending at her feet. It was an itch, like she was too hot and too cold at the same time, like she needed to swim up and breath, like she needed to live and die and be reborn, all over again…

Rey blinked and the feeling was over, and she was sprawled out on her bed with a baseball bat in one hand and Krampus’ Sack of Eternal Hell in the other. It was utterly undignified, but Rey couldn’t care. She’d beaten that demonic goat _thing_ that had darkened her doorstep.

* * *

Krampus could scream – or whatever the arcane-demon-goat version of screaming was. He needed that bag back. _Needed it._ Especially around this time of year. _Krampusnacht_ had only been the beginning, and he’d been beaten by some _child._

_Nineteen._ Hardly of marrying age, by his standards. But the world had changed, and now nineteen was seen as a suitable age for a mother. A _mother._ It was children bearing children, and it was abhorrent. The grown-ups of this age had done their children a _great_ disservice.

And this was coming from _Krampus._

He paced around his cave in frustration. It was a wonder she’d been able to see him in the first place. Her house had been decked to the nines in iron and protective enchantments; she’d even left an offering. It was rare to find a mortal who subscribed to the old ways, rarer still to find one with The Sight. He’d have to use an impenetrable glamour.

He’d have to find a way to get into her bedroom and _get his thrice-bedamned sack back._

* * *

Rey liked to pretend that she _didn’t_ have a massive canvas sack filled with god-knows-what eldritch horrors sitting in her closet. She also liked to pretend that she hadn’t had an encounter with a horrific creature born from pagan myths. Furthermore, she _didn’t_ like to admit that she invested in _much_ more steel appliances and trinkets for a sense of security.

Boots? Steel in the toe. Earrings? Surgical steel. She even went as far as to buy an extra stainless steel butcher knife and keep it in her nightstand drawer.

_Nothing_ was going to get the drop on her. Not this time. Sometimes, she thought it might’ve been a massive hallucination, that some sort of chemical had leaked into the air, maybe a brief episode of psychosis, but no – she still had Krampus’ sack. She’d done her research, and according to all sources it would be better off if she didn’t look inside.

It had been three days since the Krampus incident, and Rey was finally beginning to relax. She’d done her best to not be alone in her house too often, and if she was sleeping there alone then she’d be sure to be exhausted enough to knock out immediately.

She was walking home from the supermarket when she bumped into the tall stranger, slipped on ice, and dropped half of groceries.

The stranger cursed in what sounded like German. “Sorry,” he said, in perfect English. “Here, let me help.”

Rey looked up at him. He had dark hair and pale skin, a long, narrow face, and a prominent nose, and he was gathering the apples that she’d dropped.

“Bruised a bit,” he said, “But they should be okay.”

“Yeah,” Rey said, picking herself up. Her wrist stung from how she landed on it, and her palms were skinned and bloody. She winced. “Sorry, I completely didn’t see you.”

“Don’t be – it looks like you got the wrong end of the stick. Where were you going? I can help you carry these.”

Finn was already waiting at her house, and Rey wasn’t sensing any red flags. “Sure,” Rey said. “I’m just around the block.”

He insisted upon taking most of her bags. “Are you a student?” Rey asked him. Naboo was a college town, and he looked like he might be in his early twenties, but his demeanor seemed much older.

“Yeah,” he said. “I’m in graduate school. You?”

Rey nodded. “Sophomore.”

They talked on the walk back; he’d occasionally warn her of patches of ice and she’d thank him, and the small talk came easy and he was a perfect gentleman.

“Thanks for helping me,” Rey said as she unlocked her door. “By the way, what’s your name?”

He smiled. “Kylo Ren.”


End file.
